Joe
Louis, perhaps the greatest of all heavyweight fighters, came to be
nicknamed the Brown Bomber for blockbusting right and the color of his
skin. Joe Louis Barrow. Born on May 13, 1914, in Lafayette, Alabama, was
the son of a sharecropper who died when Joe was four years old. The family
moved to Detroit, Michigan where Joe helped support them when only sixteen
by taking odd jobs that included work as a sparring partner in a local
gym. This led to a boxing career that finally saw him take the heavyweight
title from Jim Braddock in 1937. He defended his title more than any other
champion in ring history of the time and only Jack Dempsey outpolled him
in the Associated Press survey of 1950 in which sports writers picked the
best boxers of the century. Louis lost three times in a career interrupted
by service in World War II, once to Max Schmeling, whom he knocked out in
a rematch, before he became champion, and then to Rocky Marciano and
Ezzard Charles, after he retired as undefeated heavyweight champion but
was attempting a comeback. His ring record included sixty-four K.O.s,
eight decisions and one win by default. A Joe Louis is synonymous for the
utmost in a fighter, a heavyweight without peer.